Snyder says he'll continue to push for international bridge

Owners of the Ambassador Bridge have been spending millions of dollars fighting a proposed second bridge connecting Detroit and Canada.

Mike Russell
/ Wikimedia Commons / http://j.mp/1SPGCl0

Governor Rick Snyder said the state needs to invest more money in its roads and bridges, and he said he’ll continue to push for a new, publicly owned bridge linking Detroit and Canada.

Snyder made the remarks in a special message to the Legislature today.

He said a new international bridge will help create jobs and more markets for Michigan products.

“We’ve had some setbacks, but again, following my philosophy of relentless positive action we are going to stay relentless because I believe it’s in the best interest of all our citizens… You couldn’t find a better partner in the world than to partner with our neighbors in Canada and build a bridge,” said Snyder.

Governor Snyder wants lawmakers to find nearly $1.5 billion in additional revenue to help pay for road and bridge repairs and maintenance. He says one way to fund that would be to eliminate the 15-cent fuel tax at the pump in exchange for a wholesale gasoline tax.

Governor Rick Snyder’s administration is looking how it might move forward construction of a new international bridge connecting Detroit and Canada without the approval of the Legislature.

A measure necessary to project died today (Thursday) in a state Senate committee, and Republican leaders say it appears the bridge project cannot win legislative approval.

But the new Detroit bridge remains central to Snyder’s long-term plans to make Michigan a Chicago-to-Montreal transportation corridor. Geralyn Lasher is the governor’s spokeswoman. She said the administration is considering its options.

"We have to look at it all, and we will look at it all very closely now because –very disappointed about today. It’s too important to jobs, it’s too important for Michigan. It’s too important to really say goodbye to this kind of money that we can leverage to all parts of our state to fix roads, to fix bridges, and to move forward," said Lasher.

The bridge was also going to be used to leverage millions of dollars in federal road and bridge money for projects across the state.

Lasher says there is a lot of misinformation being spread about the project.

An independent watchdog group called ads being aired statewide by bridge opponents “flagrantly” false.

Governor Rick Snyder and state Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville (R-Monroe) will meet this afternoon to discuss what should happen next with a stalled international bridge project proposal.

Richardville says he could potentially move the proposal to build a second bridge between Detroit and Canada out of the committee where it has failed thus far to gain enough support to move to the Senate floor.

Richardville has suggested moving the proposal to his own Government Operations Committee.

State Senator Mike Kowall (R-White Lake) chairs the committee currently handling the proposal.

“I don’t want it to go to Government Ops. I started it, I want to finish it. I want to see it through to the end. Ultimately I don’t have a lot of authority to tell the majority leader what to do,” he said.

Kowall said he thinks the bridge proposal would face just as many hurdles on the Senate floor as it is in his committee to gain approval:

“Oh that’s just a microcosm of what’s going on, there’s a lot of discussion here, in caucus, outside, all over. So there’s a lot of discussion.”

He continued:

“You ever go to the dentist and have a root canal done? Well it’s always a good thing when it’s over with, so I liken this to a root canal. No, I’d like it to be over one way or the other.”

Kowall said one of the issues creating some division is whether a bridge proposal should include a measure to help members of the community that would be displaced at the new bridge location in Detroit.

Governor Sndyer says he wants the issue approved by the end of the year.

A proposal to build a second bridge between Detroit and Canada appears to be the cause of a fierce divide among Republicans in the state Senate.

The chairman of the committee handling the proposal does not seem to have enough support among Republican colleagues to vote on the issue.

State Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville said if that’s the case he will most likely take on the issue in a committee he chairs and move it along quickly.

“I don’t think we would need to take as much time to go through all the detail, but we have been following the process, we’ve been following the information, so we would still take a hard look at it and take some open testimony, but we’re not going to rehash everything that’s been done for the last nine months,” said Richardville.

Richardville says misinformation floating around in television ads and brochures have made the bridge issue more confusing and frustrating than it should be. He says the Senate could vote on the proposal within a couple weeks.

A report from the Anderson Economic Group has offered some clarity to the debate over a new international bridge crossing between Detroit and Windsor.

A little background in case you have sat this story out thus far:

Governor Rick Snyder has been pushing the idea of a new bridge two miles south of the Ambassador Bridge, known as the New International Trade Crossing(NITC).

It would connect up I-75 and Highway 401 in Canada.

The Ambassador Bridge owners, the Detroit International Bridge Company (DIBC), don't want competition from another bridge. Owner Manuel "Matty" Moroun has been fighting against the proposed bridge with a $4.7 million television ad blitz.

The ads say Michigan taxpayers could be on the hook for the costs of theNew International Trade Crossing if plans don't pan out.

Moroun is proposing to build a second span next to the Ambassador Bridge to ease congestion.

The report from the Anderson Economic Group analyzes both proposals (NITC vs. DIBC).

The bottom line of the report from several media reports out today is that the new bridge (NITC) would ease congestion currently felt at the Detroit-Windsor crossing, and a second span of the Ambassador Bridge would not (DIBC).

The Detroit International Bridge Co.'s proposed second bridge between Detroit and Canada would not eliminate the current congestion on both sides of the border but the New International Trade Crossing bridge would do so, according to an independent study released today by the Anderson Economic Group.

A proposed government-owned bridge over the Detroit River, with additional U.S. Customs booths, would do a better job reducing border traffic congestion and handling future traffic than a second Ambassador Bridge span, says a new independent report released today.

A proposed bridge two miles south of the Ambassador Bridge would alleviate border congestion, but a new span beside the Ambassador would not, according to a study released Tuesday.

Finding no. 3 in the report states that the obligation to repay borrowed funds for the construction costs of either bridge does not rest with Michigan taxpayers. That finding assumes that protections for Michigan taxpayers are in place for "statute and bond covenants."

Jeff Watrick over at MLive has a nice summary of the 7 findings of the report.

There now seems to be an increasing likelihood that Governor Snyder may bypass the legislature and find another way to build a new bridge across the Detroit River. Late last week, a spokesman for the Ambassador Bridge Company said that would be outrageous.

He said it would be a perversion of the process to build a new bridge after the legislature said no. If that were the case, he might have a point. But that’s not at all what happened.